X-Plane12

X-Plane 12 : Rhode Island FlightSim Expo 2025 The Laminar Research team were at the Rhode Island FlightSimulation Expo 2025 (27th to 29th June), and LR has a big presence here this year, with a Booth (701), Workshops and RAVE party in a nighclub? Laminar had an announcement segment for 15 minutes late Friday (27th) in a booked stage event and the last announcement of the day, there was no Q&A segment after the announcement, which is a usual practise, so it was all very business like. Presenting were Ben Supnik (engineer), Thomson Meeks (PR), Alex Unruh (art) and Phillipp Ringler (systems) in attendance (Austin Meyer the founder of X-Plane only bounced on the sta…

X-Plane 12 : State of the Union 2024 I started the "State of the Union" for the X-Plane Simulator last year to keep a record of the progression of the Simulator in development, but also to see where we are standing year upon year. We all know that Simulation in any form is an ongoing development, as simulators never have an end date, they never reach a final completed version. It is a journey, an ongoing story that will never really end. In the last State of the Union (23) we were left in a sort of "Neither here or there" situation. The X-Plane 12 Simulator version was a year out from it's "Beta" release, but still a lot of the early development wa…

X-Plane 12 : Las Vegas FlightSim Expo 2024 Every year the FlightSim Expo comes around, and it is a sort of Simulation's WWDC (Apple) in what is new and coming in Flight Simulation. This year it was a very good Expo, a solid one actually, even very interesting. Yes Microsoft and the Flight Simulator FS brigade dominated the Expo, that was to be expected, but 2024 was a more even event for X-Plane users as well. For a start Laminar Research were there, all the major people in Austin and Ben (Supnic) were also in attendance this year, Ben as we shall see did the Announcement Seminar and spoke for 9 minutes or so, and that is always a good thing. …

X-Plane 12 : State of the Union It is really hard to believe that even at this point in time, that when X-Plane 12 was finally released, or as it was labelled as in it's "Early Access" and "Beta" release form. Such has been the developments of the last twelve months. Last year around June 2022 there was still a lot of speculation mixed in with a bit of fear. The X-Plane 12 development was seriously dragging on, and even a Dev Deep-Dives series with FSElite (10 episodes) didn't quell the uneasy feelings. And Austin Meyer the X-Plane Simulator founder, by then also became more and more outrageous in his broadcasts to cover the waiting. We tried to lo…

X-Plane 12 Roadmap v12.1.0 Laminar Research have issued a Roadmap on the immediate future of the X-Plane Simulator. And a very interesting Roadmap it is. First is the price increase of X-Plane. The price of the Simulator will change from US$59.99 to US$79.99 with the introduction of a new numbering system starting with version v12.1.0... yes there is an extra digit in there, but in reality it is also a start of a new era in X-Plane version numbering, with more incremental releases for quicker (smaller) and more frequent changes to the simulator. I have over the last few years asserted that X-Plane is simply too cheap, and it needed more…

X-Plane 12 - NavData changes As the first NavData release comes around since X-Plane 12 was unleashed on to the world, there are some interesting changes you need to be aware of. Cycles known as the AIRAC (Aeronautical Information Regulation And Control) cycle is used and produces revisions every 56 days (double AIRAC cycle) or every 28 days (single AIRAC cycle). This is the aeronautical data that runs behind the scenes to create a mirror realistic world of real navigation data to fly the aircraft. There are two (subscriptions) to update to the current cycle data data; one is Navigraph, the second is Aerosoft's "NavDataPro". …

X-Plane 12 - Beta 8 It is hard to believe we are already up to X-Plane 12 Beta 8, yes version eight of the beta run. Are you enjoying X-Plane 12 yet? Personally I think it is incredible, loads of bugs, but the dynamics and certainly the realism in feel is extraordinary. X-PlaneReviews images are a great way to see the differences between X-Plane 11 and X-Plane 12. First note for X-Plane 12b8 is that it screws up the "BetterPushBack" plugin, a fix can be found here; Github Let us start with a nice addition in Beta 8... Pilots. In both the Boeing 738 and the Airbus A332 there are now animated pilots, a male and a female, they…

X-Plane 12 - Next Generation X-Plane Beta release "Early Access" The X-Plane Flight Simulator was originally released as X-Plane 1.00 back in 1995 which is now 25 years ago. Basically every 4-5 Years Laminar Research the X-Plane's developers releases another numbered upgrade version of the Simulator, the current version is v11 (v11.53) that was released originally back in March 2017. Each release is a new version and to use it, it will have to be repurchased, the cost of X-Plane 12 is US$59.95. But the initial cost also covers all development and any new features for that full version run, up until the next version is released in the development cycle in…